“Lady, we can’t do anything about a threat. We have to wait until he acts.” “You mean after I am shot?”

“Assault weapons will remain readily available to crazy people,” wrote Stephen King in his essay on gun control and violence, “until the powerful pro-gun forces … accept responsibility, recognizing that responsibility is not the same as culpability.” Every few months, a heartbreaking news headline announcing another mass shooting confirms King’s conviction. Recently, after nearly the entire city of Boston was under lockdown as a suspected terrorist with a handgun roamed the streets, I was reminded of a highly symbolic vignette from The Diary of Anais Nin, Vol. 4: 1944-1947 (public library) — the same tome that gave us Nin on the meaning of life and why emotional excess is essential to creativity — that illustrates the uncomfortable disconnect between such local, situation-specific defense measures and our general legislative approach to guns.

In June of 1944, Nin met a young sailor by the name of Harry Herkovitz, whom she describes as “dark, intense, lean” and who had written “a strange story, influenced by Edgar Allan Poe, about ravens attacking a traveler.” A protege of Nin’s longtime lover Henry Miller, Harry soon develops a fierce infatuation with her, one Nin astutely recognizes as based on a projection, a myth, and thus not real, since she knows that “where the myth fails, human love begins.” Nin observes in dismay:

I realized he did not see me as I am, that he was seeking a myth. He was calling on an Anaïs as described by Henry, which bears no resemblance to reality.

In August, she writes:

Seeking to break the friendship with Harry, I became more and more aware that he is disintegrated, chaotic, unbalanced.

Then, one day in October:

I received a telephone call from Harry Herkovitz. He said: “I am waiting downstairs with a gun. I’m going to kill you.”

“You can’t force people to love, Harry. I have been a good friend. Your girl loves you deeply, and that is rare to find.”

“I’m going to kill you.”

“I will call the police.”

I hung up. I called the police station in our neighborhood. I explained what was happening. The answer was: “Lady, we can’t do anything about a threat. We have to wait until he acts.”

“You mean after I am shot?”

“Yes, lady. People get millions of threats every day. We can’t do anything about that.”

“But you are only two blocks away. Why can’t you send someone to see if there is a young man with a gun waiting in front of 215 West Thirteenth Street? He has no right to carry a gun.”

“We can’t do that.”

I stayed home all day. In the evening, I became restless. I called up a friend Harry does not know and asked him to come and see if Harry was still at the door. He came. Harry was gone.

It’s sad — tragic, really — that seven decades later, rather than amending this attitude, we’re clutching the Second Amendment with trigger-ready talons, using it as justification for signing Nin’s experience into policy: The government is now Nin’s local police station, not even just refusing to act until someone is shot but refusing to legislate until well after a number of gruesome shootings, hoping instead that the metaphorical “Harry,” that quintessential threat of brutality enabled by arms, would simply be gone.

Bringing you (ad-free) Brain Pickings takes hundreds of hours each month. If you find any joy and stimulation here, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner:

You can also become a one-time patron with a single donation in any amount:

Brain Pickings has a free weekly newsletter. It comes out on Sundays and offers the week’s best articles. Here’s what to expect. Like? Sign up.

newsletter

donating = loving

Brain Pickings remains free (and ad-free) and takes me hundreds of hours a month to research and write, and thousands of dollars to sustain. If you find any joy and value in what I do, please consider becoming a Member and supporting with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner:

You can also become a one-time patron with a single donation in any amount:

Brain Pickings participates in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn commissions by linking to Amazon. In more human terms, this means that whenever you buy a book on Amazon from a link on here, I get a small percentage of its price. That helps supportBrain Pickings by offsetting a fraction of what it takes to maintain the site, and is very much appreciated.